


As Ugly As I Seem

by AdieuCaribou



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: F/F, badass chidi but......later on lol, badass eleanor, badass tahani, because its from eleanors pov so of course it is, but also funny!, hes doing his best, most of the OC's arent that important, never was there a more wretched hive of scum and villainy, old western style, tahani doesnt even come in until the second chapter, this fic is dark and gritty, this is also incredible self indulgent, this is also incredibly slow burn im sorry!!!!!, with cowboys and deserts and saloons and debts and death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-10
Updated: 2019-04-10
Packaged: 2020-01-11 03:28:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18421875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdieuCaribou/pseuds/AdieuCaribou
Summary: Eleanor wakes up dead and is given a choice: survive among the worst humanity has to offer, or be tortured by a psychopath for the rest of eternity. It's not much of a choice, really.I'm not great at summaries, browse through the tags, that gives a better introduction than this!





	As Ugly As I Seem

Eleanor blinked, and found herself staring at an unfamiliar desk in an unfamiliar room. The walls were dirty and decrepit, drywall littered with cracks and Eleanor swore she saw a millipede in the corner. Nothing she hadn’t seen before if she was honest, she’d been in living situations dirtier and stuffier than this before. Just another day in her life. The desk sitting across from her was empty, simply oak wood and a leather office chair with no signs of ever having been sat in before. A door slammed behind her. 

“Jesus Christ!” She exclaimed, jumping and twisting on the uncomfortable metal stool she had been sat in. 

“Not quite!” replied the culprit, an amused lilt in his voice as he swaggered his way over to the empty desk, “But I’ve been having one hell of a time torturing the guy for being a false prophet.” He laughed at himself, as if enjoying some sort of inside joke. Eleanor didn’t get it.

Her brain was still struggling to keep up with this sequence of events- one minute she was grocery shopping for her favorite trashy margarita mix, next, she was faced with a strange man in a blazer and a trilby (gag) cracking jokes Eleanor wasn’t quite understanding. 

“What the fuck is going on?” She asked, because that was really the only thought that managed to form fully in her mind at the moment. 

The guy threw himself into the office chair, spinning in it like a child. 

“Great question,” he laughed, “congrats, you’re dead!”

Eleanor scoffed, “Right…” she drawled, “am I on a prank show? Is this Punk’d?” She got up out of her stool to exaggeratedly scrutinize the room for cameras. “Ha-ha, very funny! Come on out, Kutcher!”

Blazer-man just laughed harder. “Nah dude, this isn’t a prank show! That’d be one dope prank though, can you imagine? Boom, ambush a guy, knock ‘im out, bring him to some gross dirty motel, and tell him he’s dead. Oh god that’d be hysterical.”

“Okayyy,” Eleanor drawled out the word, interrupting blazer-man’s rambling train of thought, “so what is this? Obviously I’m not dead, or I’d be see-through like a ghost or some shit, right?”  
“No, seriously, dude! You’re dead, watch,” in the blink of an eye, the man reached into his blazer and pulled out-- holy fuck, that’s a pistol! Eleanor scrambled back, swearing and shouting, but before she could reach for the handle of the door beside her, he had leveled the barrel between her eyes and shot her point blank. 

Eleanor blinked, breathing heavily and fingers shaking when she opened her eyes to see the exact same dirty, decrepit room she had been killed in. Wait, how did that make any sense?  
Her vision was corrupted with the man from before, and the hand that once held the pistol was stuck out to her, offering a shake. She nearly flinched. 

“I’m Trevor, your demon guide to The Bad Place! Also known as Hell.”

Eleanor’s heart was still racing. “Holy fuck,” she breathed. She didn’t take Trevor’s hand, “Seriously man, you gotta start explaining shit or I’m gonna lose it,” she warned. 

Shrugging minutely, Trevor withdrew his hand. “Well, okay, so like I just said, you’re in the Bad Place, which means during your pathetically short life you didn’t do enough good stuff to balance out the bad stuff. But you also weren’t like, totally evil, so we aren’t sending you straight to fire and brimstone and whatever. Anyway, we’re giving you three chances to survive in this world, but if you’re killed for a third time, I get to use you for my own experimental torture for eternity!” He seemed positively gleeful. 

Eleanor was silent for a moment. “Scratch that, I’m losing it anyway. Oh my god, what the fuck is happening. This is seriously fucked up, man. I’ve gotta survive for eternity in some shitty place, or else I’ll be tortured for eternity in a shittier place? Dude, what did I ever do to hurt you?”

Trevor shook his head. “Nah, it wasn’t me you hurt. I’m not the judge or the jury, just the executioner. Anyway,” He started again, clearly beginning to get antsy, “That’s all you get to know for now. Good luck!” He snapped his fingers, and the room around her disappeared, along with Trevor, that absolute motherfucker. Eleanor spun around frantically, trying to get her bearings, and noticed something felt different about her attire. She looked down to find, Jesus Christ, Trevor, that huge dick, dressed her as a goddamn cowboy. She’d gone full Han Solo meets Indiana Jones, with a leather vest, worn-down jeans (they weren’t even skinny fit! If Trevor were still there she would’ve thrown down immediately), and a ten-fucking-gallon hat (which, granted, was better than that greasy trilby). She was fitted with a holster, too, the pistol that Trevor had used to prove his point to her tucked neatly into it’s leather hold. It was a chore to stop herself from muttering an aggressively southern “what in tarnation”.

“Asshole,” She muttered, and took stock of her surroundings. She stood in the middle of a dusty road that stretched to the horizon in both directions. Behind her, mountains stood tall and proud, brushing the cloudless sky. In front of her taunted an empty desert, without so much as a cactus to disrupt the scenery. That emptiness freaked her out a little, so she spun on her heel and trudged towards the mountains. 

The sun burned hot in the sky, but being born and raised in Arizona, Eleanor wasn’t suffering as much as she could’ve been. But don’t get her wrong, she was definitely suffering, and she was making damn sure the lizards that scurried beneath her feet from time to time knew it. 

“Oh my god, this is awful, it’s so hot, there’s fucking nothing here, I’m so thirsty, this stupid desert is just like Arizona, why was I cursed to live in my dumb fucking state for eternity?” She lamented to scaly skin that left hurried claw prints in the sand. She’d been dragging her feet for hours, pouring sweat, and her stomach was beginning to rumble, yet she felt as if she was getting no closer to the mountains she had set her sights upon. Were they even there? Or was this a trick designed by that Trevor or whoever he worked for to make Eleanor hate her life (or, death, she supposed) a little more? But she had no other prospects, so she walked and walked, until the sun dipped low on the horizon and the chill of a desert night began to set in. Another step forward and she heard a crunch and a squeak beneath her boot.

“Ewwwww!” Eleanor exclaimed as she looked down to see a lizard’s arm squished under her foot. It wriggled, attempting to get away, and she nearly let it, but her rumbling stomach stopped her. “Aw, jeez. You’re one unlucky lizard, little dude.”

Her stomach churned as her other boot came down upon its head, killing it instantly. She spent the better part of an hour fumbling around with twigs that littered the ground skinning the animal’s tough skin with an exceedingly small knife she found in her vest pocket before she was able to get a flicker of a fire going, and held her kill to roast over the flame.  
The process was nearly enough to kill her appetite, nearly being the key word. The monster in her belly groaned louder with each passing minute. 

“Alright, alright already. Eugh,” Eleanor’s featured were screwed up in disgust and she watched the last few drips of the lizard’s blood drain into the sand, and her small fire began to crisp up what little meat was on the bones of her extremely unappetizing meal. 

She waited, turning it on the stick poked through the little body until she was too hungry to wait anymore, and she picked at the slightly undercooked meat with her teeth. 

The lizard was barely enough to stave off her hunger. With a pained whine, she tossed the picked-through bones behind her and pouted. She looked down the road she was following, dusk darkening the sky from yellows and oranges to navy blues and purples. But to her surprise, a flicker of yellow remained in the distance, illuminating the foot of the mountain range. Fuck, was that civilization?!

“Holy shit!” Eleanor leapt to her feet, and without even bothering to stomp out her tiny fire, she all but ran to the direction of the shifting light with renewed vigor. 

It was at least another hour before the building was a tangible distance in front of her, and Eleanor was bone tired. She dragged herself the rest of the way, moaning and groaning, stumbling finally through a door constructed by actual people. 

The interior of the establishment looked like it was pulled directly from the page of a tacky western movie, a saloon-type bar with seedy individuals playing cards at tables, drinking whiskey, and going quiet at Eleanor’s pitiful entrance. Ugh, whoever designed this hell (Eleanor blamed Trevor) definitely watched too many Clint Eastwood movies. 

Eyes followed Eleanor as she, with whatever remaining dignity she had, made her way to the figure behind the bar. She pulled herself up onto a stool and waved the bartender over. 

“Please tell me you’ve got food and water here,” She said dryly. The man nodded and disappeared into a back room. She made a face when she noticed broken glass strewn about the bartop, and brushed it aside carefully. “Gross. This place needs some major renovation. HGTV, where are you when we need you?”

The man returned shortly with a bowl of something steaming and a glass of lukewarm water. 

“What, you don’t have ice or anything?” Eleanor complained. The man simply raised his eyebrow and ignored her. Eleanor rolled her eyes but soon the smell of the stew she had been served was too overwhelming and she scarfed it down. It was nearly gone when a flash of nerves flooded through her, fuck, she didn’t have any money. Chewing slowly, her eyes fell upon the glass she pushed aside earlier. She glanced back up at the barkeep, who was serving someone else at the moment. She swallowed and discretely took a few pieces of the shattered beer bottle and dropped them in her stew. She almost grinned at how simple it was, she had done this trick so many times before at unsuspecting restaurants, it was just so easy with the broken glass laying just within her grasp.

“Hey, what the hell is this? Are you trying to kill me? Why is there glass in my food?” Eleanor raised her voice, getting the attention of everyone in the bar. The bartender turned a disinterested gaze toward her. Eleanor looked at him expectantly, waiting for a sincere apology and an offer to waive the check. 

“What do you want me to do about it? That’s ten units, by the way,” he glared instead, blindsiding Eleanor. This was not the response she’d gotten in the past.

“Ten units? For this bowl of crap? Forget that,” she pushed the bowl away furiously, gulping down the rest of her water and turning around. But before she could even face the door she had walked into this mess with, something hard and dangerous pressed between her ribs. Eleanor turned wide eyes to the imposing figure who seemed to just appear at her side. Who knew hell had bouncers? It didn’t matter, the nose of a gun was poised to kill and she beginning to shake. There was a clink behind the bartop, and she turned back to where the tender was standing, and empty whiskey glass in hand.

“Pay up, or you’ll regret it. Bruce isn’t a very forgiving man,” the bouncer ground out menacingly. Eleanor shifted uncomfortably.

“Well, joke’s on you, asshole. I don’t have any money!” She said this proudly, as if she wasn’t about to be shot dead, so to speak.

The man behind the bar, Bruce, snorted, “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he set his glass down, and leaned back on his elbows. His eyes roamed over her a little too intensely. It was a look Eleanor recognized, that she used to take advantage of in clubs when guys would try to get her drunk and she took their money instead. She suspected this time though she wasn’t at the advantage, who knows why, maybe it was the gun pressed between her ribs?

“You willing to work it off, sweetheart?” Bruce continued, his smile sly and dirty. Eleanor wanted to gag. 

“Gross, dude. I’m not whoring myself off to you, creep,” she wrinkled her nose at him. 

He laughed at her, loud and abrasive. “Yeah, i didn’t think so. You’re fresh meat, huh? You’ll learn soon enough. You a good fighter, babe?” 

“I can slap a bitch if I want to,” Eleanor tried to keep a brave face, but his nicknames were getting really irritating and she was sure the nose of the gun on her was beginning to bruise her skin. She was unwisely confident, and again, Bruce leered, mirth in his eyes and shaking his shoulders. 

“You’ll need to get used to doing a little more than slapping around here,” he looked to the guard holding his gun to Eleanor and raised his voice to get his attention, “go get her a rifle. Let’s see if she’s a good shot. And don’t even think about turning it on me missy, you’ll be dead on the ground before the slug leaves the pipe.” 

With the gun no longer bruising her ribs, Eleanor could take a breath of relief. The bartender pushed through the door closing the bar off from the patrons, and rounded his way to Eleanor. With a threatening grip on her shoulder, he pushed her forward to lead her to a backdoor out of the establishment. 

“Let go of me,” Eleanor complained, shaking his hand off her shoulder, “I can walk fine on my own, asshole.” She could nearly feel his eyes roll as he relented his grip. 

The back of the bar faced out to what Eleanor could imagine was a shooting range of some sort. There was a worn-down wooden fence, a short expanse of flat, dusty earth, and person-shaped planks were staked in the ground at varying distances. Each target was littered in bullet holes. 

A rifle was shoved into Eleanor’s arms, startling her. She stared down at the weapon, thoughts blank for a moment, as if just now comprehending her sticky situation. She wasn’t wildly unfamiliar with weaponry; she knew her way around a paintball battle and she’d had a couple boyfriends during her life who were a little too into firearms than she should’ve been comfortable with (what can she say, hindsight is twenty-twenty), but she was now being faced with the fact that if she were to survive this hellscape, she was going to have to shoot to kill. Fuck. 

She felt a shove at her shoulder. “Well? Come on, sweetie, we don’t have all day. You do know how to shoot, don’t ya?” There was a sneer in Bruce’s voice, and if there was one thing that pissed Eleanor off more than anything, it was condescension. Fuck this guy, she’ll show ‘im!

“Alright, alright, I’m going! Chill, man,” she positioned herself so her thighs were almost in contact with the low fence that separated the patrons and the range, and she awkwardly adopted a stance. She tucked the end of the rifle in her shoulder and pressed her face down until she was looking down the barrel in a way she was familiar with, but mostly because that’s what she was used to seeing in movies. Hopefully her spite would carry her through her nerves and she wouldn’t fuck this up. 

She took aim at the closest target, released the safety, and fired. She wasn’t expecting the force of the kickback of the weapon, and Eleanor was immediately glad she had the forethought to tuck the backend into her shoulder, or it might’ve gone flying out of her hands (that was an exaggeration, but it sure as hell felt that way). The shot cracked loudly in her ear, and Eleanor quickly turned a cry of surprise into an excited whoop. 

“Woo!” She shouted when her eyes fell on a fresh smoking hole in the chest of her target. She suddenly felt more awake than she had in hours, adrenaline surging. “Damn, is this was firing guns always feels like? I think I can sympathize with the NRA now.”

She took aim again, this time at a farther target, but her adrenaline high got the better of her and the bullet flew through the hand of the target. Another attempt and she hit the chest dead-center. Another shot, and an even farther target received a new hole in the thigh. 

“That’s enough,” Eleanor jumped when Bruce’s hand gripped the barrel of the gun and yanked it out of her hands. He nodded to her holster. “Let’s see how good you are with that pistol of yours.”  
Oh my god, Eleanor was an idiot. She totally forgot that Trevor had outfitted her with that weapon. She wanted to slap herself, she could’ve used that ages ago, god dammit!

She pulled the weapon out of it’s holster and tried to remember how Trevor had used it on her. Hesitantly, she tugged at the back of it, satisfied when she felt the safety release. With two hands, she took aim, again at the closest target. She grumbled in annoyance when she couldn’t decide if keeping both eyes open or closing one to peer down at her target would help her accuracy, but irritatedly settled on closing one. That’s what they did in those old westerns, right?

Eleanor was disappointed to see that the bullet only nicked the target’s ear. 

“Okay, that’s all I need to see,” The quiet ringing in Eleanor’s ears from the repeated crack of the bullets muffled Bruce’s voice. She holstered the pistol. 

The rifle was hauled back into her arms, to Eleanor’s surprise, and she took a second to blink before belatedly tuning in to whatever nonsense Bruce was talking at her (turns out it wasn’t really nonsense, Eleanor just didn’t like him and was bitter therefore she didn’t want to listen). 

“I’m going to give you a choice, sweetie,” Bruce started.

“I have a name, dude. Eleanor,” She interrupted. 

“Okay, Eleanor,” His inflection didn’t change an inch, but Eleanor got the feeling he was mocking her, “I’m going to give you a choice. You can either pay off your debt to me, however I choose to make you pay, or I can shoot you where you stand.”

That last word was said with finality, and Eleanor felt goosebumps on her arm. 

“That’s… not really a choice, but okay, fair. I’m not gonna waste a life over a bowl of crappy stew. I think you know my answer.”

Bruce’s reptilian grin made Eleanor’s stomach churn. She really hoped she had made the right decision. 

Bruce explained to her that in order to pay off her debt (which was really racking up, as he so generously offered to let her stay the night and eat his food and take his weapons), he was going to send her on a hit. He handed her a piece of paper with a sketch of a man (whose name Bruce mentioned but Eleanor couldn’t quite remember. Something like Cheeto Agony? Crispy Anthropology?) who owed Bruce money and demanded that Eleanor either drag Chimney’s ass back to Bruce to “face the music” or kill him and bring his body back if he doesn’t comply. A classic “dead or alive” situation. Bruce even promised to pay her a little extra to “get her the hell out of his town”, so really, who was Eleanor to say no?

And so, the next morning, Eleanor once again faced an empty, dusty desert road. Though this time, there was food in her backpack and a crude map in her hand, and a new sense of purpose. 

Half a days’ travel took her to the next town over (Eleanor was beginning to realize that when someone said “town”, what they really meant was a cluster of shacks, a place to drink to forget, and maybe an inn or two. It was really depressing) and, with a lunch break marking the end of one journey and the beginning of the next, Eleanor was pushing open the doors to a bar, whose sign out front named it The Red Maiden. It was every bit the trashy kind of bar Eleanor would spend hours in on weeknights, drinking away her woes and finding someone to fuck in the bathroom. Ah, memories. Broken beer bottles and sticky floors, really bad live music and loud arguments, heavy makeouts and suspicious stains. It really was starting to feel like home. 

Eleanor dropped heavily down in a chair at a table full of dangerous looking men who were leaned close together in deep conversation. They paused to send Eleanor threatening glares. Eleanor shifted to subtly show off her weaponry. At least, she thought she was being subtle (she was still new at this, give her a break!).

“What’re you lookin’ at?” She sneered meanly. She took out the folded up sketch of the Cheeto person she was looking for and scanned the bar. Nope, no nerdy looking guys with glasses that could so easily be broken in a bar fight. A shadow went over her shoulder, and she whipped around to confront whoever was poking their nose into her business. 

“Are you looking for that guy?” The woman she was faced with said before Eleanor could get a word out of her mouth. She was holding a tray of drinks in her hand, obviously an employee at the bar. Eleanor snorted at the woman's attire: a frilly, knee length red dress. Red Maiden, Eleanor thought, very funny. 

“Yeah, I am. Have you seen him around?” 

“He’s been in here a few times. He’s so skittish though, never sticks around for more than ten minutes? He just gets something to eat then runs out,” there was an amused smile on the woman’s face, “He’s chatted with Josiah a few times though; he works behind the bar.” She jutted her chin to the bartop and the older man standing behind it. 

“Thanks for the info, beautiful,” Eleanor offered the waitress a smile before making her way through the crowded bar to this Josiah guy.

“You need a drink?” Josiah asked flatly when Eleanor leaned across the counter.

“No, actually, I need to ask you about someone,” she held up the sketch of Cheeto, waiting for him to recognize the man she was after. 

“Oh, yeah. That’s Chidi,” Josiah answered after a pause, “I haven’t talk to him much, a nervous fella. What do you want to know?”

“Just where he might be. He’s got some debt that’s catching up to him.”

Josiah peered at her, “You with Bruce?”

“Uh, not really with, more like I’ve gotta find this Cheeky dude or Bruce’ll blow my brains out,” Eleanor wrinkled her nose. Josiah snorted.

“Yeah, sounds about right. Don’t know how that guy is so good at indebting people to him, he’s really got a gift.”

“Yeah, yeah, he’s an asshole, do you know where Cheeto is or nah?” Eleanor knew she was being rude, but she was a woman of action, of instant gratification. Small talk was irritating, unless she was flirting. 

Whatever friendliness that had built up between her and Josiah dissipated immediately, but he didn’t question her. “I don’t know exactly where he’s camped out, but he mentioned finding solace in the mountains or something like that. He’s probably out by the mountain trails, they start about ten minutes east of here.”

“Thanks, man. I owe ya,” Eleanor said nonchalantly as she turned to leave. Josiah eyed her.

“Be careful throwing around phrases like that here. These people will take you seriously.” Eleanor swallowed at the ominous words of advice. She didn’t turn back to acknowledge Josiah, leaving the establishment with a couple afterlife lessons and a shaky breath in her lungs.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey lovelies! This is the first fic i'll have posted to AO3, and I'd love to hear your thoughts! I've started on chapter two, but you may have to kick my ass into gear to get me to finish it. This fic has been in the works for a long time, and because I love grit and angst and there isn't nearly enough with this pairing, I'm really excited to share my own work. Enjoy!!!


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